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Put together these auto-fanning terrariums with some computer fans I had laying around:

I plan on building 8 of these altogether. I already have the terrariums themselves I just need to get the computer fans, then I'll have them send fan speed data back to an arduino or something.

Does anybody have experience using anything like this? Should I push fresh air in through the top like I'm doing here, or would pulling it out of the bottom work better? My only concern is the fan maybe drying out the casing. So far I've only had tiny little baby fruits on the cake I put in there but it was cased late and may have been a problem cake to begin with. Comments, tips, and advice are all welcome!

Correct me if I'm wrong but FAE is needed to induce fruiting, correct? And you need to exchange CO2 for fresh air at some point at least once during the day at a minimum to have healthy fruits, correct? Manually fanning 8 tubs every day is a pain in the ass, all I'm trying to do is maintain FAE exactly like you would by manually opening them up and fanning them every day. Unless you don't fan your tubs at all?

The two tubs are just a prototype to get the timing and speed of the fan dialed in so I can scale it up to 8 of them. The fans are on a programmable timer and speed controlled. If it's drying them out, I can just reduce the speed and/or the frequency and duration the fan comes on, or I can place it at the bottom of the tub so it pumps CO2 out rather than blowing fresh air in. Currently it is "blowing" so gently you can barely feel it, and it only comes on every two hours for 10 minutes.

Fanning does not give FAE. Fanning is only meant to kickstart evaporation off the substrate after a misting, and its actually pretty pointless. No real need to fan manually ever.

But it really confuses people.

A fruiting chamber needs to find a balance. It should allow as much frequent air exchange as possible without drying the substrate out.

I use monotubs usually. They use holes for FAE stuffed with polyfill, with the tightness adjusted, to do the balancing. It holds in as much humidity as possible while letting in as much FAE as possible. They never need misting, or fanning.

If you are using cakes you are most likely need to mist no matter what. Its just a fact of life for cakes. Time has proven the SGFC to be the most practical for cakes.

Bulk substrates are big enough to provide thier own humidity and therefore can be used in fruiting chambers like monotubs.

Alternatively you can grow in open air and mist all day, or use a greenhouse with humidifiers.

Why are you fanning 8 tubs anyways? If you don't have any holes, or don't leave the lid cracked you could fan those tubs 20 times a day and still have big lack FAE problems with your fruits dude, because fanning doesnt provide FAE.

How are you doing your grows? Bulk substrate in a big tray / tub with lid?

Look up monotub, and dub tub, or build a greenhouse. You will thank me. A 5$ bag of pillow stuffing might solve all your problems

Quote:How are you doing your grows? Bulk substrate in a big tray / tub with lid?

Ya, rye seed to a manure/straw/coir mix in those black trays. I spawn my bulk mix in the black trays, cover them with foil, punch some holes in 'em, and let 'em run through in the same cabinet I do my jars in. Then two weeks later or so I case them, give them another week, take the foil off and move them to the terrariums in the closet. The most recent ones I lost track of and cased late though I should have just let them pin out with no casing

Quote:How are you doing your grows? Bulk substrate in a big tray / tub with lid?

Ya, rye seed to a manure/straw/coir mix in those black trays. I spawn my bulk mix in the black trays, cover them with foil, punch some holes in 'em, and let 'em run through in the same cabinet I do my jars in. Then two weeks later or so I case them, give them another week, take the foil off and move them to the terrariums in the closet. The most recent ones I lost track of and cased late though I should have just let them pin out with no casing

Well then next time you should try spawning in the monotubs like my photo there.

You could probably just set those trays inside a monotub if they fit right. But the sterile tubs are su per convienent, theyre cheap, clear, stackable. You never have to mist or fan. Most you need to do is adjust the polyfill from time to time but once you get the hang of dialing in tubs you wont even need to do that.

The holes stay taped up u ntill you fruit, then the tape comes off poly goes in.

Quote:mushpunx said:Why are you fanning 8 tubs anyways? If you don't have any holes, or don't leave the lid cracked you could fan those tubs 20 times a day and still have big lack FAE problems with your fruits dude, because fanning doesnt provide FAE.

You can see plainly in my pics I have holes in my tubs, in exactly the same places yours are, I'm simply using foam plugs instead of polyfill and I'm using black trays inside my tub instead of the bottom of the tub itself. I decided on that method because I don't have enough space to keep the entire tub in the dark, this way I can do the spawn run in a smaller space and constantly have tubs on rotation.

I simply thought fanning was needed to clear out accumulated CO2. I have already yielded multiple pounds with this set up but I was opening the tubs two or three times a day and fanning them out. Stamets even has a section about how often air should be circulated. It obviously didn't harm them because I had great yields and that's why I was simply attempting to automate something I was doing anyway.

If it isn't needed then well that's why I'm here asking so I can continue to refine my process and learn from more experienced growers.

I have two big blue ones I'm doing exactly this with, but I never opened them to fan them and they only produced like 4 big ass monster fruits a piece. Don't get me wrong by weight it was an impressive yield one fruit was 16gr dry but it just looked to me like they were starved for oxygen, since from my reading I thought that's what they do when they're being smothered with CO2, is send out a few smaller fruits that bulk up and grow all crazy looking for air.

I would much rather just do the bottoms of the clear tubs but I wasn't sure of a way to do it where I can keep them dark until spawn run is finished. What do you do with yours?

I liked this idea too I was going to put arduino controlled leds in there along with the fans it was going to look pretty badass. I'm a little sad to be honest but I'd rather have the best quality yields lol

Why is everything I thought I knew about mushrooms apparently wrong? lol...

I thought pinning was triggered by a combination of FAE and light. So I keep mine in the dark until they're ready for fruiting. So why do I often read to use black trays to avoid side pinning and that's also why mycology supply companies carry black trays is to prevent light penetration? You're telling me I could just spawn directly to the bottoms of clear tubs and let them colonize in the same space I'm fruiting in because the light doesn't matter?

Do you have a link to a tek you could share? I have a batch of rye jars almost done and I'd rather do them in a way that lets me utilize the entire cropping surface available, rather than those black trays which are tiny in comparison.

Not... sure I understand your intentions with the way you phrased that. It's really as simple as putting a trash bag in your tub, filling it up with substrate, and trimming the edges of the bag so they don't cover the top of the substrate by folding over.

Not sure about teks, for different sized tubs I just use different sized trash bags. I have one size tub and one size bag in particular where the bag doesn't need any trimming at all to work for the tub. Those bags are white, and work the same as black or clear ones.